On Tuesday night, there was vandalism reported at Quebec’s Artificial Intelligence Institute, Mila, and an AI company located in Montreal’s Mile-Ex neighborhood. The incidents involved smashed windows at the research institute specializing in AI deep learning and the nearby software company, ServiceNow. Graffiti with the message “Burn the Data Centers” was found painted on one of the buildings.
According to Manuel Couture, a spokesperson for the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM), patrol officers discovered the vandalized buildings around 11:45 p.m. on Tuesday. A 25-year-old woman was arrested near the scene and taken in for questioning. The police suspect a group of around 10 individuals to be behind the vandalism.
The vandalism occurred amidst growing concerns about the rapid advancement of AI technology globally. Recent public statements made by Jacob Coxon, a researcher at the AI company Anthropic, regarding the potential dangers of AI development have sparked widespread debate on the topic.
Following Coxon’s remarks, Anthropic’s CEO, Dario Amodei, released a blog post advocating for a slower pace of AI development to prioritize public safety. Several industry leaders, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Google DeepMind chief Demis Hassabis, and Elon Musk, expressed support for Amodei’s stance.
Michael Cant, an AI consultant, expressed dismay upon witnessing the vandalism at the Mila building on St-Urbain Street the following morning. Cant highlighted Mila’s strong advocacy for AI safety in Canada and globally, emphasizing the validity of concerns surrounding AI technology.
The All In AI and tech summit, one of Canada’s largest, commenced in Montreal on Wednesday. The event is set to feature prominent speakers such as Mila’s founder, Yoshua Bengio, and ServiceNow’s VP of AI research, Valérie Bécaert. The summit is expected to gather over 6,500 AI experts and industry stakeholders at the Palais des congrès in downtown Montreal over two days.
During the summit, Mila will formalize a new partnership with the German Research Centre for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) to collaborate on research areas such as agentic AI, AI safety, and trustworthy systems. The partnership aims to accelerate technology transfer into the Canadian and German economies, with a memorandum of understanding set to be signed at the event by leaders from both research centers and government representatives.
